After my fight with the Sirens, I found myself questioning my power. I questioned the reason for my mutation, and what sort of abilities it held, but I also began to question my powers in and of themselves. Why was I blessed with magic? For what reason had the gods divided man into the chosen and unchosen? Why was it that this great power that I was given seemed only to render things to ash, it sought only to destroy, not to create nor to protect.
“Magic is a blessing”, many would say. But was this power not more like a curse? Hideous and cruel, I hated it. The beautiful and spectacular magic I had oh-so-loved started to take a more and more twisted appearance in my mind ever since my battle with those villains.
“Hey, what are you thinking about?” my thoughts were clearly written on my face, as I was interrupted by a poke in the cheek by Ashlyn. “Nothing much,” I said.
She sighed, “I can tell you’re lying, you know~?” she said in a playful tone. “Forget about it, it’s nothing much anyway. What do you want help with? You wouldn’t bother me without wanting something,” I told her.
“Well when you put it like that you make it seem like I’m exploiting you, that’s not very nice. Theo,” She spoke, leading me to somewhere else. “Theo? I don’t believe we’re quite close enough for nicknames yet.”
“What else would I call you? Theos is a bit too grand of a name anyway, Sun-mage? Oh Exalted Traveller? My Hero?” She joked.
“Anything but the last one, please.” I begged her. It had been weeks since I first arrived at the village, but my wounds were too great to recover in such a short amount of time, and my thoughts were not helping me get any better. Helping her and the other townsfolk was a nice reprise from it all, the pressure, the fighting, the tension. I just needed a break.
She stopped short of our destination, right in front of a drying rack of clothes, she turned to face me and said, “Anyway, could you help me dry these? I think your fire magic would be quite useful here.”
I looked at her with amazement and then laughed, “My magic has been used to burn down entire forests, it has defeated dozens of powerful mages throughout the land, I have mastered to such a degree that I can imitate the very stars themselves, and you wish for me to use them for such an ordinary thing like drying some clothes?”
She smiled, “Correct.”
I smiled back, “If that’s your wish.” It was such a banal thing, such an ordinary request, something that no other mage would ever degrade themselves to do. But I accepted her request, because what kind of hero would I be if I denied the pleas of a maiden like her?
I conjured up a small spell of fire and then put it below the rack of clothes, carefully and precisely managing it from completely disintegrating them. It was quite a tedious task, but I found merit in being able to control my magic to such precise degrees.
From then on, I helped Ashlyn and the other villagers out. It was fun, it revived my passion for magic. I felt as though I finally had a purpose, I learned how to do many things with it. Drying clothes, cooking, heating, even sometimes cleaning. I learned that fire could be used for much more than just destruction. If I didn’t know whether something was possible with my magic, “Let’s try it then,” is what she would always say.
It was Ashlyn that motivated me to learn so much, it was she who pushed me to try out new things. I felt my previous doubts fade away in the back of my mind, for months I stayed at the village, even after my wounds had recovered. That place had become my home, I felt as though I belonged there. I accepted them, and in turn they had accepted me.
Eventually, winter came, and so did the hardships often associated with it. The cold nights were merciless, snow hailed all across the land. But it was also serene, beautiful. The old leaves wilted and made way for new beginnings. Death and rebirth.
Yet, not all was well. One of the village residents, an old man by the name of Richard, had been stuck with a severe ailment, and a cure was nowhere in sight. To acquire the medicine for his illness, we needed to trek through the wintery snowstorms just to reach a sanctuary where we could find a doctor.
None were willing to take the dangerous journey home, after all they all had their own families, their own lives to return to. It was far too dangerous, nobody would risk their lives for someone who was going to die anyway.
But I couldn’t leave a man in worry, so I took it upon myself. After all, I had no family, and I had no possessions. I had nothing to leave behind and nothing to regret, so the least I could do was save a life, even at the cost of my own, right?
“It’s dangerous, you know?” She told me.
“More the reason why I should be the one to go,” I replied back. She grimaced, in both fear and sorrow. “Just… don’t die, alright?”
I smiled, soft and reassuring, “Ashlyn, heroes never die on their quests, remember?”
By early morning, I set myself on the path to the nearest city. Ashlyn had given me the directions, but the path was already covered by thick and powdery snow. I found it difficult to traverse through, even with my magic. It felt as though I was fighting against nature itself, snow and hail pelted down on me, I used my magic to heat my body up, lest the freezing winds turn me numb.
I travelled for what seemingly felt like hours, making little progress. I could not even see the sky, for the fog clouded up even the brilliant sun. I felt my legs waver as my magic started dying out. Even I couldn’t keep it up for this long.
I felt a tremendous upheaval of my senses as the earth itself shook, something in the distance. Large and giant was speeding itself towards me, I prepared myself for battle, taking on a ready stance. But the sensation I felt was too dissimilar to that of murderous intent, it was dread. I felt looming dread creep up on me, like death itself was coming for me.
I realized that whatever was approaching was not a mortal danger, but nature itself. I saw a downpour of snow rush through the land, devouring everything in sight like a wave of white death.
It was an avalanche.
I desperately did my best to run away, to escape, but it seemed to all be for naught. As the avalanche quickly caught up to me and swallowed me whole. The thick and heavy snow suffocated me, I attempted to use my magic to crawl my way out. But it did not help in the slightest, I felt helpless and trapped under the weight of the snow.
I was dying, I felt the heat leaving my body. The cold started to grasp my soul, tugging at it, pulling me closer. It felt serene, calm. My shivering stopped, and I accepted my fate.
“Wake… up!”
I felt someone drag me out of the deep snow and then lift me up onto their back. It was strange, I had accepted my fate, but I was suddenly saved. It felt warm, as though I was back home.
“Will you… wake up already!”
A shout woke me up from my slumber, I looked around, dazed. Only to see Ashlyn carrying me on her back. “What… what are you doing out here?” I asked her. She didn’t turn to face me, “The avalanche, remember? I got worried for you so I came looking, didn’t expect to find you buried under all of that snow though.”
“You shouldn’t have come out here, it’s dangerous.”
“You’re the last person who should be telling me that. You almost died out there,” she turned to look at me, “Anyway, I think that should be enough. Could you get off my back now? You’re pretty heavy.”
I climbed down from her back and balanced myself on the ground, I still felt dazed from my near-death experience. “How long have I been out for?” I asked.
“I don’t know myself, when I left to find you the sun was still up. It’s amazing you aren’t in a near death state right now, let alone alive. Magic sure does wonders huh?”
I felt the snowstorm get heavier around us, snow poured all around us. “I think we should go find a place to rest, “ I said.
“I remember a cabin being around these parts, it was built for weary travellers who were lost in the forest. It should be around here,” Ashlyn said. Her steps were weak and trembling, she was exhausted too. Shivering in the cold, I saw her clutch on the bark of a tree just to support herself standing.
“There!” She pointed, a cabin that was almost completely entrenched in snow. She rushed over to it, nearly stumbling while doing so, while I followed behind. I used my magic to melt through the snow and enter the cabin.
The cabin was empty and cold, in the center of it was a fireplace. I quickly used my magic to conjure up a fire and then closed the door behind us. Shielding us from the frost outside. Ashlyn laid down on the floor of the cabin, wheezing from breathlessness. “Are you alright?” I asked, to which she did not respond. I put my hand on her forehead, checking her temperature. It was a fever.
She weakly slapped my hand away, “I’m… fine. Worry about yourself first.”
“Why did you come out here?”
“I could ask you the same,” She chuckled, “Have I ever told you about my past, Theos? No, right? Since we’re gonna die here anyway, I think it would be the perfect time to tell you my tragic tale.”
“Tell me when we’re out of this mess first,” I replied.
She smiled, “Don’t wanna.”
I sighed, letting her continue. “You know, it was probably 8 or 9 years ago. My parents were part of a merchant caravan, trying to sell their wares all across the land. They thought it’d be better if they stayed in a group, but that type of thinking never helped them in the end though.”
“I don’t know who or what did it, or even when it happened. I was scared, so I hid myself, I hid and waited until it was over. When the screams stopped, I got up and checked what had happened. Safe to say it wasn’t pretty in the slightest, after that, the townsfolk took me in.”
She paused before continuing, looking at me curiously, “Do you know what I thought when I saw their corpses? ‘I should have died with them.’ I was always a sickly little girl, so very cumbersome to deal with, especially for a group of travellers. A burden on my parents, I thought that maybe I should’ve been abandoned, left to fend for myself. But they never did. I always wondered why it had been them, and not me instead.”
I wanted to reassure her, to comfort her, “You don’t need to carry on that guilt.”
“I don’t, not anymore. It’s been a long time since I thought about that. My point is–When I dragged your body out of the snow, it reminded me of that scene. I thought you were dead, honestly, so when I saw your body, the first thought that rushed through my mind was the same one I had oh-so-many years ago. ‘Why was it you, and not me instead?’ Tell me, why do you think the strong have to be the ones to die? Why do you so recklessly abandon your life?”
I only had one response, the same line of thought I’d always had since I was young, “Because strength exists to protect what is weak.”
“Don’t give me that… I just… I just don’t wanna be left alone, not again… I thought you died, I really did. Don’t do that again, your life is more precious than you think.”
I gave her no response, I didn’t know what to say, nor what to feel. I was dazed and lost. I tried to apologize to Ashlyn for my recklessness but when I turned, I saw her coughing. She coughed up something crimson red, it was her own blood.
Instantly, I rushed towards her, asking whether she was alright or not. “Medicine… that’s right, we’ll go to the nearest sanctuary and get medicine for both you and the old man, just hang on–”
“No, there’s a snowstorm out there. It’s too dangerous.” She refuted.
“What do you want me to do then? We can’t just stay here until the storm nestles, it could take days or even weeks! I can’t let you just die here.”
“You won’t be reckless, I won’t let you be. If you’re going, then you’ll have to take me with you.” She tried to stand up, but once more slumped to the floor.
“You’re in no condition to go out anywhere, Ashlyn. You know that as well.”
She thought carefully, biting her lip in consideration. Suddenly, she sprung up as if she had an ingenious idea, “Theos, have you ever tried to heal someone with your fire?”
“What? No, I haven’t.”
She smirked, standing up properly to face me, “Let’s try it out then.”
She laid her head down on my lap and waited patiently as I put my hand on her stomach and conjured a magic circle. I weaved my intent carefully, as delicately as possible so as to not harm her. I had never used fire magic for healing before, and I never tried to either. I didn’t think it was possible in the first place.
I couldn’t imagine it, a fire that would heal instead of harm, restore instead of destroy. It wasn’t in my capabilities.
Failure. My magic circle broke, Ashlyn coughed in pain as a result.
I conjured another one.
Another failure. It broke again, I conjured another.
Failure. Failure. Failure. Failure.
I kept on trying and trying, until eventually Ashlyn broke out into a fit of coughing, this time even more blood came out of her mouth. I looked at her with concern and worry, doubt filled my mind as I realized my inadequacies. But she grabbed my face with her hands and looked me straight in the eye.
“I won’t let you give up.”
I resolved myself to keep on trying, no matter what would happen I would save her nonetheless. My grim face turned to one of focus, I concentrated my intent into one thing; Healing her.
The magic circle almost broke apart, but I was able to stabilize it. It had worked, the fire phased into her body, working from the inside. I carefully manipulated it to purge the illness from her body, ever so slowly.
When it was over, Ashlyn looked up at me, smiling softly “I told you it would work.”
—————
The next day, the maelstrom of snow let up. Of course, we departed for the nearest sanctuary. After procuring the medicine, we left once more to deliver it to the village. Luckily the old man hadn’t died of his ailment just yet, so we were successfully able to cure his disease without much hassle.
But I felt as though something wasn’t right, my relationship with Ashlyn had inextricably changed. So next I met her, I struck up a conversation out of nowhere, “Back then, they all called me a magic prodigy.”
She looked at me, confused. Wondering what I was speaking of. Without sparing so much as a glance at her, I continued, “That was back in Athens, my homeland.”
“Athens? You mean that far away place? What are you doing all the way over here, then?”
“Aurelian’s conquest. By the time I was already an adult, he re-ignited the flames of war and started to retake the regions he lost all of those centuries ago due to the kingslaying. I didn’t want to have any part in it, so I fled to the farthest and safest place I knew, Britannia, here.”
“Why are you telling me this?”
I sucked in the cold air and exhaled, “Since you told me your story, I thought it was only fair that I tell you mine.”
“You don’t have to,” she said. I smiled, thinking of what she had said to me not too long ago, “I want to, though.”
I continued regaling her of tales of my past, “After I fled here, I spent my time wandering here and there. Doing my best just to help people in need, I didn’t feel like I belonged anywhere,” I stopped in my tracks, turning to face her. “Until I met you, of course.”
She reciprocated my smile, “I guess that makes the two of us, then?”
